Power efficient nonlinear signal processing with Silicon nano-waveguides

• Applicants: Professor Klaus Petermann, Ph.D.; Professor Dr.-Ing. Lars Zimmermann
• Subject Area: Electronic Semiconductors, Components and Circuits, Integrated Systems, Sensor Technology, Theoretical Electrical Engineering
• Term: from 2015 to 2021
• Project identifier: Deutsche Forschungsgemeinschaft (DFG) - Project number 280092157

The project work was started 01.01.2016 (IHP Zimmermann, Gajda, contract ends 31.12.2017) and 01.05.2016 (TUB Petermann, Liebig/Ronniger, contract ends 30.04.2018), respectively. The first goal of the initial project was to investigate silicon nano-waveguide technology with waveguide p-i-n diodes to achieve real continuous wave (CW) parametric gain by waveguide-optimization as well as the fabrication of more complex waveguide structures. The second goal was to investigate possible applications in the field of optical signal regeneration. However, over the course of the project it became clear that the potential of p-i-n waveguide technology for optical nonlinear signal processing is far bigger than we had expected in the first place. Throughout our work, we realized that not only parametric gain in silicon would be important to investigate. We also perceived the chance to use a dual-polarization loop scheme to achieve polarization independent four-wave-mixing. Furthermore, we fabricated waveguide structures including ring resonators with p-i-n junctions to improve four-wave-mixing efficiency at reduced pump power. In view of the plethora of results so far and considering the enabling character of our technology, we would like to request an extension of the project until 30th of April 2020 to properly cover the original as well as additional topics. The extension of the project will focus on(A) Achievement of parametric gain using the multi-stage-pumping scheme as suggested in the initial project description.(B) Extension of the polarization diversity loop scheme to signal regeneration(C) Study of high conversion efficiency phenomena in low-loss ring resonators at low pump powers.

• DFG Programme: Research Grants